Are you getting tired of contemplating weight issues? I hope not because I’m intent on doing this weight loss thing. I really want to make the January 2009 trip to Daytona Beach, and I really want to make the trip to Italy with Maureen without all of this weight. And I really want to look nice in that cute little red dress, and the clothing line my daughter is going to design for me and women over age 50. So if you bear with me for just a little while, we are going to move on to fun stuff like what women over 50 are interested in.

We can’t all be slim as Susan Sarandon and the other 60-ish ladies of movie fame. But we can become the women we want to be. Do you have an internal, in your mind image of how you really look to you? Does it come anywhere near the woman you see in the mirror? When I look in the mirror I see my mother. My husband and I were driving down the road one day and I looked at the mirror on the passenger door of the truck. I did a double take. “When did my mother get in with us?” I asked. I am much too young to look like my almost 77-year-old mother. If you are content with you, that’s all that matters.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that more than 60 percent of U.S. adults are overweight. The culprit: Poor diet and physical inactivity. We have talked about that over the past couple of weeks, especially the physical inactivity part. And I set a two-pound per month weight loss to take the weight off slowly and keep it off. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recommends losing weight slowly. A health care professional should be involved in determining the best program for you, a program with sensible goals.

· Exercise 30 minutes daily.
· Eat less fat and sugar.
· Eat a variety of foods to get the vitamins and nutrients you need.
· Don’t be misled by fad diets.
· Do you really need diet pills? Talk to your doctor.
· Before joining a weight loss program, you need to know things like how the program works, is it safe, and how will it help you to achieve your goals and maintain your weight loss?

In 2004 the FDA’s Obesity Working Group announced plans to help combat obesity:

· Stronger food labeling
· Educating consumers about healthy diet and weight.
· Restaurants to provide calorie and nutrition information
· Food industry to develop healthier foods.

Reportedly, successful weight losers have four things in common:

· Eat low-calorie, low-fat diet
· Eat breakfast
· Very physically active
· Monitor self by weighing in frequently.

For me, that means going directly to the kitchen in the morning instead of going directly to the computer where I get lost until lunch time and hardly realize that the morning has passed without breakfast. And if I go to the kitchen to eat, I should go dressed and ready to do a 30-minute walk before I walk back up those stairs to my computer.

Losing weight is not just about counting calories. It’s also about physical activity that “burns calories, increases the proportion of lean to fat body mass, and raises your metabolism,” advises the FDA.

Women need to eat daily from the five food groups:

· Vegetables, 3-5 servings
· Fruits, 2-4 servings
· Breads, cereals, rice, pasta, 6-11 servings
· Milk, yogurt, cheese, 2-3 servings
· Meat, poultry, fish, dried beans and peas, eggs, nuts, 2-3 servings

Knowing that my mother packed on too many pounds as she got older and became less active has always weighed on my mind, but not enough to motivate me to be more active. She has suffered high blood pressure for years. Other potential issues that could affect any of us who are overweight or obese include heart disease, diabetes, gallbladder disease, and joint pain, to name a few.

There is a whole lot of living for the over-50 crowd to do, but we have to be able to bend over our bellies to tie our shoes. You do know that the Senior Olympics will be coming up in May during Older Americans Month, don’t you? Are you training for your favorite category?